Help:Using NWNWiki
This article provides some information on how to make the most of an account here on NWNWiki. Page types As with many wikis, NWNWiki has several types of pages serving different purposes. The probably most commonly seen type of page is an article. Each article is named for the topic it covers and seeks to provide information about that topic. These are the pages that supply the information that is "from NWNWiki", and their entire content is open to revisions as needed. Each article has an associated talk page, named "Talk:" followed by the article's name. These talk pages provide a place for contributors to discuss the article with the goal of improving the article. Since these discussions can be useful for avoiding mistake repetition, they are never deleted. (However, some old or long pages do get archived in order to keep the active talk page tidy.) In addition, comments on talk pages are not edited for factual correctness nor for grammar (except by the person who wrote the comment in the first place). Articles are collected into various categories. A category page is named "Category:" followed by a name for what it collects. Categories organize the articles to make it easier to find related topics. Category pages typically have a short (one sentence) description of what they collect, sometimes with a link to a related article for more information. (For example, Category:Abilities links to the ability article for those who want to know more about abilities in general, while the articles for specific abilities are collected in the category.) The rest of the category page is automatically generated based on which pages have been placed in the category. Like articles, categories have talk pages for discussing and improving the category. The names of these talk pages are the category names with "Category:" replaced by "Category talk:". Categories can collect other categories, which are then listed as subcategories within the larger collection. Unless there is a compelling reason to do otherwise, an article in a subcategory is often not directly included in the parent category. So a reader looking for a particular article in a category may want to check any relevant subcategories that category might have. The other page type that is fairly common is the user page. Each registered user has a page of their own named "User:" followed by the user's name. These pages are used in different ways. Some people use their user page to introduce themselves to others, while some use it to keep track of what needs to be done. For the most part, the content of these pages is whatever the user wants it to be (provided it is done in good faith; stuff like spam is not wanted even on user pages). Consequentially, a user page is usually only edited by the person whose page it is. Users also have talk pages, named "User talk:" followed by the user's name. A user's talk page provides others a way to communicate directly with that person about something related to NWNWiki, but perhaps not specific to an article. (Communication about a particular article should usually be handled on that article's talk page.) When a message is left on a user talk page, that user is notified the next time he or she next views a page on Wikia. There are two schools of thought on how to reply to comments on one's own user talk page. The first treats these talk pages the same as other talk pages and has replies going on the same page, under what they are a reply to. The other has replies going on the user talk page of the person to whom the reply is directed. The former has the advantage of the conversation being collected in once place, while the latter takes advantage of the wiki notifying users when their user talk page has been modified. The former relies on people remembering to look for replies (as must be done on other types of talk pages), while the latter relies on people remembering what they wrote earlier (or going to the other user talk page to refresh their memory). One can often tell which school of thought a particular user subscribes to by looking at older comments on the user talk page. (Most users of NWNWiki subscribe to the former.) Watchlist A handy way to track changes to pages of interest (both regular articles and talk pages) is the watch list. A page can be put on a user's watch list either by clicking the "Watch" or "Follow" link (at the top, side, or bottom of each page, depending on the skin being used) or by checking the "Follow this page" box when editing the page. Changes to pages on a user's watch list are listed under watch list, and they are highlighted in the list of recent changes. This makes these changes easy to spot. Users may also opt to hide minor edits to avoid being distracted by formatting changes, allowing them to focus on the content changes. Using NWNWiki